The Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday welcomed Slovenia’s plan to establish a representative office in Taiwan, after Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Jansa revealed the plan in an interview with Indian TV station Doordarshan on Monday.
Taiwan is a democratic country that respects international democratic standards and international laws, the Slovenian prime minister said in the interview.
Slovenia and Taiwan are working on “exchanging representatives,” he said. “Of course, this will not be on the level of embassies. It will be on the same level as many of the EU member countries.”
Photo: screen grab from Doordarshan
“When I spoke with our businessmen who are trading with Taiwan, they told me that we are trading with Taiwan, but those companies from Taiwan are also trading with mainland China... They are doing this amongst themselves, but at the same time they’re opposing the same relations between Taiwan and other countries, which is ridiculous,” he said.
While the naming of the Taiwanese Representative Office in Lithuania has sparked some criticism in the EU nation, Jansa said that he did not consider it an issue.
“Lithuania is not an exception. There are some slight differences in naming the missions, but this is not important,” he said. “I think that any kind of proceeding pressure on Lithuania and some other countries in Europe will not benefit China’s government. Good trade relations are a common interest.”
After witnessing Taiwan’s disease prevention measures during the COVID-19 pandemic, Jansa said he personally called Minister of Health and Welfare Chen Shih-chung (陳時中) and they spoke via videoconference.
“Actually, we have normal relations with Taiwan,” he said.
Jansa said that he had visited Taiwan four or five times, and that he holds the view that Taiwanese should have the right to determine their future.
“If they want to join China, if it’s their free will without any pressure, without any military intervention and without any blackmailing, without strategic cheating as it is happening in Hong Kong currently, then we will support it. But if Taiwanese people want to live independently, we are here to support also this position,” he said.
“India is a crucial factor here to guarantee the balance of power and with this, the very foundation of possible peaceful solutions,” he added.
Jansa also backed Taiwan’s bid to join the WHO, saying: “I think it would also benefit China to have a neighboring country be a member of such an organization.”
Ministry spokeswoman Joanne Ou (歐江安) yesterday at a news conference in Taipei welcomed the Slovenian government’s plan to open a representative office, adding that the ministry appreciated Jansa’s “insightful” remarks.
“Prime Minister Jansa is a good friend of Taiwan and has visited the nation several times,” she said, thanking him for speaking the truth on international issues.
Taiwan and Slovenia have close economic and trade interactions, while their health ministers have shared their experiences with the pandemic via videoconference, she said.
The government would continue to deepen the nation’s relations with Slovenia and other democratic partners to develop mutually beneficial and resilient partnerships, Ou said.
EXPRESSING GRATITUDE: Without its Taiwanese partners which are ‘working around the clock,’ Nvidia could not meet AI demand, CEO Jensen Huang said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and US-based artificial intelligence (AI) chip designer Nvidia Corp have partnered with each other on silicon photonics development, Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said. Speaking with reporters after he met with TSMC chairman C.C. Wei (魏哲家) in Taipei on Friday, Huang said his company was working with the world’s largest contract chipmaker on silicon photonics, but admitted it was unlikely for the cooperation to yield results any time soon, and both sides would need several years to achieve concrete outcomes. To have a stake in the silicon photonics supply chain, TSMC and
‘DETERRENT’: US national security adviser-designate Mike Waltz said that he wants to speed up deliveries of weapons purchased by Taiwan to deter threats from China US president-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for US secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth, affirmed his commitment to peace in the Taiwan Strait during his confirmation hearing in Washington on Tuesday. Hegseth called China “the most comprehensive and serious challenge to US national security” and said that he would aim to limit Beijing’s expansion in the Indo-Pacific region, Voice of America reported. He would also adhere to long-standing policies to prevent miscalculations, Hegseth added. The US Senate Armed Services Committee hearing was the first for a nominee of Trump’s incoming Cabinet, and questions mostly focused on whether he was fit for the
IDENTITY: Compared with other platforms, TikTok’s algorithm pushes a ‘disproportionately high ratio’ of pro-China content, a study has found Young Taiwanese are increasingly consuming Chinese content on TikTok, which is changing their views on identity and making them less resistant toward China, researchers and politicians were cited as saying by foreign media. Asked to suggest the best survival strategy for a small country facing a powerful neighbor, students at National Chia-Yi Girls’ Senior High School said “Taiwan must do everything to avoid provoking China into attacking it,” the Financial Times wrote on Friday. Young Taiwanese between the ages of 20 and 24 in the past were the group who most strongly espoused a Taiwanese identity, but that is no longer
A magnitude 6.4 earthquake and several aftershocks battered southern Taiwan early this morning, causing houses and roads to collapse and leaving dozens injured and 50 people isolated in their village. A total of 26 people were reported injured and sent to hospitals due to the earthquake as of late this morning, according to the latest Ministry of Health and Welfare figures. In Sising Village (西興) of Chiayi County's Dapu Township (大埔), the location of the quake's epicenter, severe damage was seen and roads entering the village were blocked, isolating about 50 villagers. Another eight people who were originally trapped inside buildings in Tainan
RSS